What are the potential pitfalls of not properly passing form data between PHP scripts and how can they be avoided?

Improperly passing form data between PHP scripts can lead to security vulnerabilities such as SQL injection or cross-site scripting. To avoid these pitfalls, always sanitize and validate user input before using it in database queries or displaying it on a webpage.

// Example of properly passing form data between PHP scripts

// Sanitize and validate the input data
$username = filter_var($_POST['username'], FILTER_SANITIZE_STRING);
$password = filter_var($_POST['password'], FILTER_SANITIZE_STRING);

// Perform necessary validation checks
if (empty($username) || empty($password)) {
    // Handle error, display message, or redirect
    exit("Please fill in all fields.");
}

// Proceed with using the sanitized data
// For example, perform a database query with the sanitized username and password